[Discuss] Community out-reach... convert the masses?

[admin at bclug.ca (Ron)]

Looks like it's that time of month where Steve yells at clouds and Ron
defends clouds. In a new venue this month!


Steve Litt wrote on 2025-02-18 08:40:

> Desktop Windows serves a purpose in the Linux ecosystem. It keeps 
> the lazy, "I refuse to learn simple shellscripts" people off our 
> mailing lists, so our computing lives don't get watered down.

And that elitist attitude still besmirches Linux & FLOSS decades later.




> For the past 25 years, recruiting these "non-nerd" users has been 
> the excuse for making Linux ever more complexificated,

I like that word, "complexificated"!


As to the "non-nerd" recruitment, that's silly. Long time Linux users
want systems that aren't a joke to use: the ability to plug an average
laptop into a 4K screen and get mixed DPI display; ability to get
seamless multi-source audio, seamless networking, and so many other
things, that *Linux users* want and that other platform users take for 
granted.


It's ridiculous to think Linux desktop experience ought to suck like
it's the 1990s to keep things pure for some reason.


You might be okay forever yelling at the clouds because your Favourite
Distro can't even participate in a Zoom call, but the other 99.9% of the
world expects that to Just Work and if it doesn't, something's seriously
wrong.






> to the point where interchangeable parts, the step up that led to 
> the Industrial Revolution, is now very difficult in Linux.

Again, nonsense.


You chose a niche distro (Void) for dogmatic / ideological reasons
(runit init system / no systemd / no Pulse Audio), and either it's a 
lousy choice or you're just not skilled enough to tweak it enough to 
participate in simple *Zoom* calls!


You want free / FLOSS software, yet also feel entitled to get your free
software in precisely the manner you approve of.


Sounding like the people you described as:

> the lazy, "I refuse to learn simple $new_tools" people





> POSIX? Poettering himself said POSIX is no good.

Posix is nice, it's not an immutable law.

If it's so important to you, get a Mac, it's certified Posix compliant,
Linux is *not*.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POSIX#POSIX-certified


If POSIX is so important, let us know when you've switched to Mac or
some "Formerly POSIX-certified OS (again, Linux is not in *either*
category).



Also:

> Do one thing and do it well? That's soooooo 1999.

There are lots of modern tools doing great jobs at scales that have
never been possible before, but the "digital Amish" types who have some
arbitrary cut-off date for when technology should have stopped in its
tracks (1850? 1999?) cannot ever understand this.